Reality Checking February 2022

Reality Checking—Alternate Perceptions Magazine, February 2022

And the Beat goes on!

by: Brent Raynes

Looking back once again over my 55 year long ufological journey, I distinctly recall clipping out a newspaper article that I felt related to the subject from a page in the Daily Kennebec Journal of Augusta, Maine, way back in January 1967. I’ve been telling folks for quite sometime now that that marked the beginning of me becoming what I later came to understand was called, within the field of ufology itself, a ufologist. A cousin suggested my interest went back even further than these past 55 years, and that’s true, as far as the interest, because I remember when the famous Michigan sightings erupted in March 1966, when the Air Force’s Dr. J. Allen Hynek uttered those famous words “swamp gas,” that I was then quite interested, but so were a lot of other people. I did watch the skies some at night at the time, hoping to catch a glimpse of one of those UFOs. That month a man named John King up in Bangor, Maine, not that far away from where I lived back then, claimed he had seen a hovering disc-shaped craft with a dome on top hovering just over the ground. He had a pistol and he told police that he fired several shots at it. He heard a couple of pings as I remember indicating he had struck it. Soon afterwards a school chum asked me if I’d like to start up a UFO club. I told him, “Johnny, I think that would be a waste of time. If there really is something to this, the scientists will surely figure it out. What could we hope to accomplish.”

But then later that year I purchased a best-selling paperback – very popular at the time – entitled Flying Saucers – Serious Business, by one Frank Edwards. Now I had long been rather interested in astronomy and the possibility of extraterrestrial life, and so my 14-year-old brain decided whether it was logical or not, I was going to get involved in this UFO business. [You know how teenagers are. LOL!]

I certainly had no idea what lay ahead, that one day I’d visit the home of Dr. Hynek in Evanston, Illinois, have a friendly chat with him about the subject, and get him to sign my copy of his book The UFO Experience, or that I’d author three of my own UFO books, that I’d spend weeks and even months driving up and down the east coast from Maine to Florida interviewing fellow researchers and witnesses.

Wow, there have been a lot of things that I didn’t see coming! Too much to share here in MY column, in MY magazine. And I certainly didn’t foresee all of the strange directions and experiences, and the many fascinating and wonderful people who would enter my life through what initially seemed like an odd and unlikely hobby, but which quickly became much more. My UFO travels even brought me to Tennessee. After all, my wife Joan had seen a big round UFO, with others, descending straight down out of the sky toward her and others – bigger than the full moon she told me. Interestingly sitting on the hood of a car with a next door neighbor girl, she was the first one to spot it, calling out to the others and pointing up at it, at which time it changed course and ascended up and out of view.

Joan has that effect on people too sometimes. LOL!

It’s good to have a hobby. Everyone should have one. As my friend and colleague Greg Little will tell you, a hobby can expand you as a person and be a very positive thing.

Even weird ones like mine!

Disciples of John Keel

Back in October, while speaking at the Strange Realities conference in Nashville, I had the pleasure of running into Nick Valenzuela of California Creepypasta [https://www.californiacreepypasta.com] who approached me wishing to do an article with myself and others whose involvement in the UFO field had been impacted by the work and ideas of the legendary and controversial gonzo journalist John A. Keel, best known for his book The Mothman Prophecies. The feature, entitled Disciples of John Keel, just appeared in the January 2022 issue of Paranormality Magazine [www.paranormalitymag.com], and besides myself it featured fellow Keelian Steve Ward, the host of The High Strangeness Factor [Paranormal UK Radio Network], and Zelia Edgar of the Just Another Tin Foil Hat YouTube Channel (check out her just released book Just Another Tin Foil Hat Presents).

Nick and the magazine gave their blessings for us to share this great article with our readers.

Zuni Elder Clifford Mahooty

As readers of my column know, when someone of prominence in our alternative field (or someone especially close to us) passes on we will post a notice here. Sadly, on January 18, Zuni Tribal Edler Clifford Mahooty was found dead at his home in Camp Verde, Arizona. He was very open to sharing information about Native traditions and beliefs, and often spoke publicly about his interest and beliefs in UFOs. Many in the UFO field took to Facebook upon learning of his death. “I cried all day when I was told that my beloved Indian brother had been found dead in his very modest home in Camp Verde,” wrote noted UFO author Tom Dongo. “He will be irreplaceable in many of our lives, but I couldn’t be more thankful to have had him as a beloved friend,” wrote Peter Robbins, host of Meanwhile, Here on Earth.

“I am devastated by the passing of Clifford Mahooty. For 13 years he was one of my closest, dearest friends and during those years, I actually spent more time with him than anyone else I know.” Christopher O’Brien, author of Secrets of the Mysterious Valley and Stalking the Herd. Here is a video of a talk Mahooty gave at the Star Knowledge Conference in Nashville in 2014: https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=clifford+mahooty&docid=607991331513127015&mid=A1EBF0BAD16B1058B0D1A1EBF0BAD16B1058B0D1&view=detail&FORM=VIRE